A classic Rio Monday

Tonight was almost spectacularly eerie in its sense of deja vu. I stepped right into my old Rio life as if I had never been gone.... I'm back in my old room in Flamengo. Exact same room. I'm sorting through my weekend recordings from the Sambodromo, just like I used to do every Monday. And I've just found out Banga has a mandatory rehearsal tonight, for the first parade of the season on Saturday. So, exact same schedule, my classic Monday evening in Rio, trotting off to Banga rehearsal in Botafogo. Late as always, no time for dinner as always, I grab a cab as always, off to Rua das Palmeiras 26 just like always. To the beautiful little purple studio and all the chattering Banga players.

Some people I don't know at all (there's a crew of new players), some barely recognize me (there's a lot of people I have never quite gotten to know), and others give me a huge warm welcome - especially my fave third surdo player, Rato, who tells me he's been practically "dying of missing me" since I left, and all the leader guys, Dudu, Andre, Thiago, Rodrigo. We squish ourselves into the room- jeez, somehow they have packed 50 people, WITH DRUMS, into this teeny little 20x30' studio - I grab one of those familiar red straps, familiar little 16" surdos, and we're off and playing. I'd wondered if I'd remember anything, and Rodrigo, who is leading the surdos, periodically shouts over to me "'Ce lembra ou nao?" - do you remember or not? - before various tricky rhythms. But it all comes flooding back. I remember EVERYTHING. Every break. Jeez, I remember the Banga repertoire better than I do the Lions repertoire (the band I've actually been playing with recently), how freaky.

Latecomers come squishing in, with enormous surdos no less, and now there are 60 people impossibly wedged in here. I didn't think it was possible to play while standing squished so tight. Every person subtly, quietly shifts until each and every person finds a magic spot where they can see the leader, can get eye contact with other players on their part, can play, and not get killed, and not kill anybody.

For example - there's a couple new arrangements that only one third-surdo player knows. I can just barely spot the girl who knows the part - actually I can only see her left wrist, by looking through the crook of the arm of a caixa player in between us - but I can see enough to tell what she's doing. And there's another third-surdo girl far to my left who is watching me in the mirror, so I'm relaying it to her. And there's another player in front of me who can't see the first girl, and can't see me either, but can see the third girl. So as long as NOBODY MOVES AN INCH, all four of us have got the part.

Luckily nobody CAN move an inch, because we're all so tightly packed that every drummer is slotted into a tiny space of safety - bracketed by the dangerous swinging sticks and mallets all around. If I go an inch to my left I'll get whacked by that player's mallet. If I go an inch in front I'll kill the caixa player in front of me. He, in turn, is standing perfectly still and slightly turned sideways so that he isn't thrashing the player in front of him. Miraculously it all works. We sort of fuse into a single giant organism. Whenever one person starts to dance or sway or even just step in time, we all have to dance, or sway, or step in time.

There's one overall leader (Dudu) and a second leader (Rodrigo) who is in charge of just the surdos. (Surdos always have a leader. Even if you don't have leaders for any other section.) It's hilarious watching Rodrigo in action, because he's having to get about 10 new surdo players on 3 surdo parts synchronized up with 15 surdo players from last year, and he's pulling us through it all just by sheer force of will and elaborate pantomime. He is a top-level musician with a really keen sense of tempo, and watching the pained expressions that flit across his face when we drag or rush or flam is an education, and an entertainment, all in itself! Whenever things are the tiniest bit imperfect, he starts karate-chopping the parts in the air with his hands, always staring up at the ceiling as if looking to heaven above for help.

During the fastest piece, a quadrilha, the rest of the band starts sagging terribly in tempo, and Rodrigo pleads with us desperately, mutely, in pantomime: PUSH, PUSH, PUSH the rest of the band, PUSH them, PUSH them. He's pantomiming that the rest of the band is an enormous heavy obstacle and we surdos have to go go go GO GO GO GO FASTER FASTER FASTER FASTER!!!! He mimes: shove them forward, shove them forward. He starts karate-chopping the air so much he seems to be attacking some kind of gigantic aerial monster. and we all respond, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, faster, faster, faster, faster! He doesn't quit and neither do we. He mimes: GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO! He NEVER QUITS. He NEVER LETS UP. And neither do we.

I love playing here. It feels like I've always been here, like I've never left. This is my band. My home band.

After rehearsal, a round of warm goodbyes from everybody and I head off to my regular Monday visit to Carioca da Gema. Where I go every Monday. (except for those odd atypical weeks when, for some reason, I can faintly remember being in Oregon instead of in Rio.) Monday is the night of the incomparable Richah, a magnificently warm-voiced bass singer who is very famous in the samba world, and his band of Mangueira percussionists and Big Paul the seven-string guitar player. I talk to Richah later tonight - I've never worked up the guts to talk to him before - and discover he was a puxador ("puller", the main singer for the Sambodromo parade) for Mangueira, Portela, and several other escolas. Wow. He's big time. (Plus, he was really sweet when I talked to him.)

Carioca da Gema is IMPOSSIBLY packed too, just like Banga. I squirm through the crowd to the very front, find a tiny spot of room to dance, and guess who's there? Lauren and Bethan, my Verde Vai friends from London! Plus the adorable tiny tamborim player from Germany, who recognizes me from Sao Clemente. Plus several other friendly Germans who I vaguely recognize from somewhere or other. Plus my friend Pat from the Lions! Plus most of my hostel - and it's the Good Turistas tonight, they are loving it and dancing and they stay all night! More Germans start popping out of the woodwork and then I'm in a fun conversation with two of the head guys for Bloco X, the German group that I have a not-so-secret plan to play with someday. Germans and Brits everywhere! And they are all so fun!

We dance our asses off.

For some reason my samba dancing seems really ON tonight. It's flowing in a way it rarely does when I dance in the US.

I spot one more person that I recognize, sitting at a table in the back. A German? No.... One of the Brits? Irish? Dutch? He must be one of the Verde Vai players..... or did I see him at Salgueiro? Or Sao Clemente? Or from California Brazil Camp? Is he one of the Ohio choro players? Or one of the mysterious French sambistas? I walk back to the stage and ponder where I have met this guy when suddenly it dawns on me: oh my god.

He's NOT A DRUMMER. He's NOT A SAMBISTA.

He's a biologist who I went to graduate school with in SEATTLE, who I haven't seen in maybe TEN YEARS. He's from my previous life, before I had ever heard of samba. It's JASON. Who used to hang out in my office when I was studying Alaskan birds. I absolutely can't believe it. What are the chances we would run into each other ten years after grad school at a tiny little club in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil?

I go and look at him one more time and sure enough it's Jason. This time he spots and and stares at me dumbfounded, leaps up and gives me a big hug, introduces me to his friends, and we all start chattering. Yup, it's just total random coincidence. He's passing through from Paraguay.

And yet it all makes sense somehow. Because this is a Monday night in Rio, and Monday is when I see all my friends, all my friends in the world, at Banga and at Carioca da Gema.